Bible Heaven/Bible Heaven.iso/online/mhcc03/v05050

Text File | 1994-03-02 | 9KB | 146 lines

05056
 #12-17 There is not one God to the Jews, more kind, and another
 to the Gentiles, who is less kind; the Lord is a Father to all
 men. The promise is the same to all, who call on the name of the
 Lord Jesus as the Son of God, as God manifest in the flesh. All
 believers thus call upon the Lord Jesus, and none else will do
 so humbly or sincerely. But how should any call on the Lord
 Jesus, the Divine Saviour, who had not heard of him? And what is
 the life of a Christian but a life of prayer? It shows that we
 feel our dependence on him, and are ready to give up ourselves
 to him, and have a believing expectation of our all from him. It
 was necessary that the gospel should be preached to the
 Gentiles. Somebody must show them what they are to believe. How
 welcome the gospel ought to be to those to whom it was preached!
 The gospel is given, not only to be known and believed, but to
 be obeyed. It is not a system of notions, but a rule of
 practice. The beginning, progress, and strength of faith is by
 hearing. But it is only hearing the word, as the word of God
 that will strengthen faith.

05062
 #18-21 Did not the Jews know that the Gentiles were to be called
 in? They might have known it from Moses and Isaiah. Isaiah
 speaks plainly of the grace and favour of God, as going before
 in the receiving of the Gentiles. Was not this our own case? Did
 not God begin in love, and make himself known to us when we did
 not ask after him? The patience of God towards provoking sinners
 is wonderful. The time of God's patience is called a day, light
 as day, and fit for work and business; but limited as a day, and
 there is a night at the end of it. God's patience makes man's
 disobedience worse, and renders that the more sinful. We may
 wonder at the mercy of God, that his goodness is not overcome by
 man's badness; we may wonder at the wickedness of man, that his
 badness is not overcome by God's goodness. And it is a matter of
 joy to think that God has sent the message of grace to so many
 millions, by the wide spread of his gospel.
05066
 * The rejection of the Jews is not universal. (1-10) God
 overruled their unbelief for making the Gentiles partakers of
 gospel privileges. (11-21) The Gentiles cautioned against pride
 and unbelief, The Jews shall be called as a nation, and brought
 into God's visible covenant again. (22-32) A solemn adoring of
 the wisdom, goodness, and justice of God. (33-36)

 #1-10 There was a chosen remnant of believing Jews, who had
 righteousness and life by faith in Jesus Christ. These were kept
 according to the election of grace. If then this election was of
 grace, it could not be of works, either performed or foreseen.
 Every truly good disposition in a fallen creature must be the
 effect, therefore it cannot be the cause, of the grace of God
 bestowed on him. Salvation from the first to the last must be
 either of grace or of debt. These things are so directly
 contrary to each other that they cannot be blended together. God
 glorifies his grace by changing the hearts and tempers of the
 rebellious. How then should they wonder and praise him! The
 Jewish nation were as in a deep sleep, without knowledge of
 their danger, or concern about it; having no sense of their need
 of the Saviour, or of their being upon the borders of eternal
 ruin. David, having by the Spirit foretold the sufferings of
 Christ from his own people, the Jews, foretells the dreadful
 judgments of God upon them for it, #Ps 69|. This teaches us how
 to understand other prayers of David against his enemies; they
 are prophecies of the judgments of God, not expressions of his
 own anger. Divine curses will work long; and we have our eyes
 darkened, if we are bowed down in worldly-mindedness.

05076
 #11-21 The gospel is the greatest riches of every place where it
 is. As therefore the righteous rejection of the unbelieving
 Jews, was the occasion of so large a multitude of the Gentiles
 being reconciled to God, and at peace with him; the future
 receiving of the Jews into the church would be such a change, as
 would resemble a general resurrection of the dead in sin to a
 life of righteousness. Abraham was as the root of the church.
 The Jews continued branches of this tree till, as a nation, they
 rejected the Messiah; after that, their relation to Abraham and
 to God was, as it were, cut off. The Gentiles were grafted into
 this tree in their room; being admitted into the church of God.
 Multitudes were made heirs of Abraham's faith, holiness and
 blessedness. It is the natural state of every one of us, to be
 wild by nature. Conversion is as the grafting in of wild
 branches into the good olive. The wild olive was often ingrafted
 into the fruitful one when it began to decay, and this not only
 brought forth fruit, but caused the decaying olive to revive and
 flourish. The Gentiles, of free grace, had been grafted in to
 share advantages. They ought therefore to beware of
 self-confidence, and every kind of pride or ambition; lest,
 having only a dead faith, and an empty profession, they should
 turn from God, and forfeit their privileges. If we stand at all,
 it is by faith; we are guilty and helpless in ourselves, and are
 to be humble, watchful, afraid of self-deception, or of being
 overcome by temptation. Not only are we at first justified by
 faith, but kept to the end in that justified state by faith
 only; yet, by a faith which is not alone, but which worketh by
 love to God and man.

05087
 #22-32 Of all judgments, spiritual judgments are the sorest; of
 these the apostle is here speaking. The restoration of the Jews
 is, in the course of things, far less improbable than the call
 of the Gentiles to be the children of Abraham; and though others
 now possess these privileges, it will not hinder their being
 admitted again. By rejecting the gospel, and by their
 indignation at its being preached to the Gentiles, the Jews were
 become enemies to God; yet they are still to be favoured for the
 sake of their pious fathers. Though at present they are enemies
 to the gospel, for their hatred to the Gentiles; yet, when God's
 time is come, that will no longer exist, and God's love to their
 fathers will be remembered. True grace seeks not to confine
 God's favour. Those who find mercy themselves, should endeavour
 that through their mercy others also may obtain mercy. Not that
 the Jews will be restored to have their priesthood, and temple,
 and ceremonies again; an end is put to all these; but they are
 to be brought to believe in Christ, the true become one
 sheep-fold with the Gentiles, under Christ the Great Shepherd.
 The captivities of Israel, their dispersion, and their being
 shut out from the church, are emblems of the believer's
 corrections for doing wrong; and the continued care of the Lord
 towards that people, and the final mercy and blessed restoration
 intended for them, show the patience and love of God.

05098
 #33-36 The apostle Paul knew the mysteries of the kingdom of God
 as well as ever any man; yet he confesses himself at a loss; and
 despairing to find the bottom, he humbly sits down at the brink,
 and adores the depth. Those who know most in this imperfect
 state, feel their own weakness most. There is not only depth in
 the Divine counsels, but riches; abundance of that which is
 precious and valuable. The Divine counsels are complete; they
 have not only depth and height, but breadth and length, #Eph
 3:18|, and that passing knowledge. There is that vast distance
 and disproportion between God and man, between the Creator and
 the creature, which for ever shuts us from knowledge of his
 ways. What man shall teach God how to govern the world? The
 apostle adores the sovereignty of the Divine counsels. All
 things in heaven and earth, especially those which relate to our
 salvation, that belong to our peace, are all of him by way of
 creation, through him by way of providence, that they may be to
 him in their end. Of God, as the Spring and Fountain of all;
 through Christ, to God, as the end. These include all God's
 relations to his creatures; if all are of Him, and through Him,
 all should be to Him, and for Him. Whatever begins, let God's
 glory be the end: especially let us adore him when we talk of
 the Divine counsels and actings. The saints in heaven never
 dispute, but always praise.